


Tumbling down the rabbit hole

by GabbyGums



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Bi-Curiosity, Bi-Curious Dan, Dan writes fanfiction, Dan-centric, Fanfiction, Friendship, Gen, Meta, Metafiction, Phanfiction, writer!Dan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-17
Updated: 2016-03-17
Packaged: 2018-05-27 03:55:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6268591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GabbyGums/pseuds/GabbyGums
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dan reads fanfiction. But he also writes fanfiction.</p>
<p>(Rated T for swear words and mentions of sexual content.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tumbling down the rabbit hole

**Author's Note:**

> This work is very experimental. I would actually call it a character study. There are some Dan/Phil hints, but I do not consider this a slash fanfiction.  
> Spoilers for TABINOF!
> 
> This work was inspired by the fanfiction **Len & Barry Ship It** ( https://archiveofourown.org/collections/ColdFlashShipIt ), and also Dan's writings in TABINOF. Some things in there really made me wonder.
> 
> Thanks to slashbabe for beta-reading this!

Dan loves fanfiction. No, really, he does. Since the very first day he discovered them, he never lets a day pass without reading any. He first delved into fanfiction when he discovered that his favourite _Pokemon_ fansite also hosted stories next to fanart and lore. He eventually ventured to other websites (and other fandoms). If there was one thing he really loved about the internet then it was the rapid opening of yet another archive or social media to share even more fanfiction.

Fanfiction.net had been the first website he had dug into. There were actually some gems among the flood of Mary-Sues, Self-Inserts and MPreg stories. After he discovered tumblr, however, he rarely visited fanfiction.net. Nowadays he mostly scrolled through the endless depths of tumblr and, only very recently, AO3.

He wasn’t that picky when it came to genre or the actual quality of the fic – he could enjoy the weird, creepy and downright bad stuff just as much as the really good ones. He wouldn’t tell anyone, but he was particularly fond of the _My Immortal_ series. Its badness was intentional, he knew it, and it made him laugh every time he read it. At the same time, though, he had spent an entire night reading _Rerparations_ from start to finish and believed it would have been a nice addition to the actual HP canon series.

He picked his fanfiction like he picked his breakfast cereal; if he felt a bit silly, he would go for a crazy _Naruto_ High school-AU; if he felt sad, he would pick a particularly bad _Avengers_ fic and laugh at its stupidity; if he felt horny, he would find some Mikasa/Eren story (or that kinky Haru/Mako/Rin bondage thing…) and lock himself up in his room for a few hours. There was literally nothing that didn’t exist, and if you can’t find it on AO3 or tumblr, you will find it elsewhere. The internet is vast, a bottomless pit of weirdness and cats.

However, Dan thought that the actual beauty of fanfiction lay in the fact that they expanded his experience of certain fandoms he already loved and cherished. For example, when the _Harry Potter_ books ended he had not been ready for the story to end. The internet hadn’t been ready either (and probably never will be judging from the ever growing numbers on AO3), and so he can enjoy the freedom of imagining that Harry became a healer after the war ended – and hooked up with Draco. Because, honestly, even he wasn’t blind to that amount of sexual tension. He also believed that _Attack on Titan_ wasn’t updated as often as he would like it to, so he appreciated the AUs out there to fill the void. He also thought that Captain America was an entirely underappreciated character (although he would never tell Phil that).

Fanfiction just managed to fill this hole in him. Not the one labelled ‘existential crisis’. That one was probably never going to be filled. He couldn’t put a finger on it, on the exact feeling, or name it properly, but it was there, every time he finished a show or waited for the next episode. It was a bit like craving sweets in the middle of the night when you know that your flatmate ate the rest of the Jelly Babies and the shops just closed for the night. Fanfiction was like the secret stash of Malteasers you kept in a box labelled ‘Wires’ just to fish them out from under your bed and enjoy a midnight snack to satisfy the sugar cravings.

Well, he didn’t particularly hide his fascination with fanfiction, but he also didn’t talk to Phil about it that much. He did suspect that Phil at least guessed that he wasn’t only laughing at silly cat pics on tumblr…or that he would lock his room to look at them for that matter. He was pretty sure, however, that Phil didn’t even dream about Dan’s all-time favourite fandom. Or, as they call it, Phandom.

Yes, it was weird! It was the weirdest thing ever! It just happened, that one time he had stumbled upon a fic on tumblr and accidentally read it. Okay, maybe not accidentally. He had been aware that Phanficiton was a thing but never bothered to further investigate. He had been way too occupied with re-discovering _Pokemon_ fanfiction at that time. But as fate had it he happened to click on a Pokemon-Phan-AU with him and Phil being Poketrainers. It hadn’t been very long – or very good – but Dan had enjoyed himself so much. He soon sat there cry-laughing which caught Phil’s attention from across the room. Phil had been busy researching some stuff for his latest video, but looked up from his laptop with a worried expression. “You alright?” he asked. Dan just laughed some more before he wordlessly handed his laptop over for Phil to read. He skimmed over the page, and Dan could see Phil’s face change from astonishment, to amusement, and then very quickly to something resembling disgust. “What is...Ew!” He pushed Dan’s laptop across the table, shaking his head like he wanted to shake an especially bad image from his mind. “Seriously, why are you reading this? The beginning bit was quite funny, but that thing in the end…” He shook his head again. Dan just laughed and said, “I’m definitely going to make a video about this!”

And he did. Phil even agreed to shoot some scenes with him. Phil had, however, explicitly reminded Dan several times that “I’m not doing any of that weird stuff!” – as if Dam had actually considered doing that…which, yes, he had. The resulting video was great, but from that point on, it all went downhill. Not for his channel, no, that just seemed to gain even more followers after _I will go down with this ship_ had been uploaded. He kinda expected it – but he didn’t expect for himself to tumble down into the rabbit hole without ever finding a way out again.

From the time he found the Poketrainer-AU he had been on a nearly endless hunt for more Dan and Phil fanfiction. Before he could consciously notice it, he was obsessed. First, he only searched for more Pokemon-related stories. Then, he actually read _The Skin Fic_ which someone highly recommended on tumblr. He didn’t find it that bad, but he made the serious mistake of showing it to Phil – it scared him for life. Dan made a mental note that he should probably keep his future discoveries to himself. He then jumped right into reading _The Hat Fic_ – big mistake. Dan had a very high level of tolerance, but this one was just too much (that monstrosity was the actual reason why he didn’t want a hamster in his house – he couldn’t even look at one anymore). Dan proceeded to skip everything that was titled _The ___ Fic_ , but otherwise, there was nothing out there that could shock him that much. By the time he hit 4 million subscribers, he was pretty sure there wasn’t anything out there that he hadn’t read (except for the aforementioned ones).

He kept his Phan-addiction secret. At least he guessed that Phil didn’t think that he was reading stories about them on a regular basis, except for when he wanted to do a video about it. But what he definitely didn’t know – and oh, this was so much worse than reading it – Dan actually wrote Phanfiction. And _only_ Phanfiction.

It had started out as an innocent joke – okay, maybe not that innocent. Throughout his research Dan had found a number of fics which depicted him as the ‘sub’ part of the relationship (or as AO3 would tag it ‘bottom!Dan’). After the n-th story about him begging for more, he got a bit annoyed. After all, he could be dominant as well! It wasn’t so much that there wasn’t any ‘top!Dan’ out there, but the amount was scarcer than he would have liked. And so, after reading another fic where Phil was again behaving way too manly and dominant (talking in a ‘husky voice’ and ‘grunting’ out demands), Dan had had enough. It had been a really shitty day for him and he had felt sort of horny and thought that reading something before going to bed would calm him down a bit. Instead, he had felt even more infuriated by what he had just read. Without even thinking about it, he had opened a blank page on Office and smashed the keys on his keyboard, creating the filthiest piece he could think of. When he had finished and realized what he had done, he smashed the laptop closed, slammed it under his bed and hid under the covers. He felt so deeply ashamed he could barely sleep or look at Phil the next day. Phil had been worried, but Dan’s mumbled excuse “Bad night” was enough for him to just leave Dan alone for the remainder of the day.

Dan had been brooding all day long. He had watched random cat videos on YouTube for 6 hours straight (he never thought a cat could be so afraid of a cucumber) – but on his phone. He didn’t dare look at his laptop. After Phil had gone to bed, Dan lay in his bed not knowing what to do. His phone’s battery had died two hours ago and he was just too lazy to get the charger from the sitting room. He lay there in the dark, contemplating his life and trying to ignore this urge to get his laptop from under his bed. Normally his existential crisis would interrupt everything else he actually wanted to do, but that night it had been the other way around. While his fingers itched and twitched he inwardly shouted “LIFE IS LIMITED” over and over again, but to not avail. He knew this was wrong. Writing fanfiction about something was one thing – fuck, even writing Gary Stue or self-insert was better than this. If he had just written about some other fandom!

Well, he was not new to this. In his teenage years, right up until university (which really ruined everything for him, he realized at that moment) he had been an avid writer. He had kept a journal in his sock drawer were he had jotted down ideas for his _Pokemon_ fanfiction (yes, he had been all about it). Back in the days, the community had called them ‘fan stories’, and he had been a prolific writer. People on the internet had liked his works. In school he had always got good grades on his creative work, and his mum had always loved his writing. But she was his mum, so it didn’t really count. For a very fleeting moment in his life he considered becoming an author, but then reality hit him, and earning money instead of following his dreams had seemed the better, more sensible choice.

University had ruined everything for him – his ambitions, his dreams, his sanity – everything had been smashed by boring lectures and the ensuing dismal outlook on his life. Taking a gap year had seemed like an escape from all of this. As he had told his followers, he didn’t do much during that year, but he did stumble upon his old _Pokemon_ journal. When he had hold it in his hands, he was filled with nostalgia, and a strange kind of yearning. He had flipped through the little book all afternoon, smiling to himself and quietly laughing from time to time. He remembered the late nights tapping away on his computer, quietly, as he feared his dad might catch him. He remembered the rush of excitement at creating his own world, getting lost in it and having to write it down until everything was said. He remembered the sleepless nights and the drowsy school days afterwards, half asleep in maths class and struggling to stay awake but thinking, nonetheless, that it had all been worth it. However, Dan hadn’t tried writing anything again at that point. He had been too scared to fail. He was scared that he wouldn’t feel the same as back in the days, and he didn’t want to tarnish those memories.

So it had been quite a surprise that he had written something without even thinking about it for a second. And it didn’t make it any better that, of all the thing he could have written, he wrote a smutty Phanfiction.

Dan rolled onto his side, blinking in the darkness. He had been too lazy to turn on the lights. He stretched out his right hand, trying to reach the lamp on his bedside table. It was out of reach, and he let his hand fall to the bed, heaving a deep sigh. He contemplated just going to sleep, but he couldn’t make his brain shut up. This was the reason he didn’t sleep most nights. It was like his brain suddenly turned into the annoying background music in the Topman shops. It was too loud for comfort but you couldn’t turn it off. At least you could leave the shop, but Dan couldn’t just kick his brain out of his head.

His hand twitched again on its own accord, and Dan began to seriously worry about his mental stability. He had been evading the problem at hand (literally) for the whole day, and his body didn’t seem able to contain his curiosity anymore. Yes, Dan was curious. He couldn’t remember any of the things he had written, strangely enough, and he had been wondering. Was it actually as bad as he was now trying to persuade himself? After all, it could just be much ado about nothing. And how _real_ could this actually be? How real _could_ RPS be?

And that exactly was Dan’s dilemma. He believed that RPS wasn’t really about the actual people. After all, everything one was presented with was a persona and not the actual person. Dan strongly believed in this and therefore didn’t mind people writing about him and Phil for that reason. They both may be more honest on camera than a lot of pop-stars out there, but they also only show what they want the audience to see, leaving out the bad bits. The problem with him writing RPS about himself and Phil was that he actually knew all the good and bad bits of both of them. He didn’t get the benefit of a doubt here. Additionally, RPS is usually the imagination of a fan believing that friendly banter means sex at night, but which is still only a fantasy. Dan, on the other hand, wrote something that depicted him and his best friend having steamy sex – and that had to mean that he was actually wishing for said thing to happen, right?

Well, Dan had to be honest with himself. He was curious. Over the years, he had caught himself imagining how it would feel to just close the short distance between him and Phil and steal a chaste kiss; during lonely nights, he imagined how Phil would react if he just crawled into his bed at night; he imagined how Phil would feel against him, how different his frame would feel in his arms compared to that of a girl. Those had been fleeting moments, and he always had been able to shake them off quickly. He had by no means wondered how it would be to be with Phil alone. Some of his friends (and celebrities) had been the secret victims of his curiosity, and by now Dan was sure that his sexuality wasn’t as straight as he had thought. He didn’t dare try anything, though. He liked the way things were. He didn’t want to change anything. He just kept wondering. But wondering was normal, wasn’t it?

What if writing this fanfiction was just an extension of this wondering? What if it didn’t mean anything?

Dan took in a deep breath and made a decision. In one smooth motion he dived forward, grabbed his laptop, sat up and opened it. The document with the ‘monstrosity’ was still open, and Dan scrolled up to the beginning and read. It wasn’t as bad as he had imagined. He even liked it. And suddenly he was filled with the urge to write more – to write something more real, something slow. And before he knew it he had opened another document and started typing. This rush of excitement clouded his mind, and he got completely lost. When he finished his last sentence and the clock on his laptop announced that dawn was upon him, he felt oddly relaxed and contented. He shut down is computer and lay down on his bed, falling asleep almost instantly, with his lips curved into a smile.

From then on Dan wrote on a regular basis. He was addicted to it. His writings were confined to the Phandom, though. After he wrote a few more pieces he even decided to upload them – on several, anonymous accounts, of course. His first creation, however, he never published. Although he had liked it he was timid about uploading something as smutty as that (even though there was worse stuff out there). He wrote any genre that he could think of, from AUs to platonic relationship and even some mild sexual content. He also differentiated between intentionally badly written and his best writing style. He just loved all of the genres and styles; anything could hold a challenge for him. Even badly written fanfiction required careful refines if he wanted to make it believable.

He only had two rules he never broke: first, he would never write any ‘bottom!Dan’; and second, he would not go into too much detail of the day to day life’s of him and Phil. This last rule sometimes proved quite difficult. But he needed to stick to it in order not to give away too much of his and Phil’s private lives. Instead, he made up a lot of other things. For example, for one of his writer personas he had the recurring theme of Phil having a thing for _My Little Pony_.

He did quite well as an author – multiple authors, to be precise – and soon managed to gather some dedicated fans of his works around himself.

There were days when Dan had trouble looking Phil straight in the eye, especially when he had spent the previous night writing about them both having sex. Phil apparently interpreted Dan’s occasional strange behaviour as the side effects of his ever ongoing existential crisis. Dan was okay with that. He thought that as long as Phil didn’t find out it was okay for him to write. He just enjoyed it so much, and if he wasn’t hurting anyone with his stories, then everything was fine.

He sometimes wondered how Phil would react if he found out, though. Dan’s brain unhelpfully supplied him with the image of Phil’s face contorted into utter disgust, disbelieving eyes narrowing on him and uttering “Dan, you’re disgusting!” – and then he storms off, packing up his things, leaving to stay with someone else until he has found a place to live, far, far away from Dan. This was the last thing he wanted. He couldn’t live without Phil. He was his best friend, maybe even his only true friend. For Dan to loose Phil would mean to lose a part of himself. Even though they only knew each other for a relatively short time they managed to create a world together which Dan knew he could not live without – not anymore. He sometimes considered deleting all of his dirty secret off the internet and his hard drive, especially on his bad days, when he was haunted by Phil’s disappointed look during sleepless nights. But, just like reading fanfiction, writing became his new addiction. It was even worse than Malteasers. He couldn’t’ just stop writing without feeling the strange emptiness in his head and a yearning twisting the insides of his guts. Instead, he took all safety measures he could think off – creating different new email addresses for his several accounts, uploading only in incognito tabs, and deleting his web history daily anyway. Most importantly, he saved his stories on a special external hard drive he bought for this exact purpose and hid it in his underwear drawer.

The reason he loved writing about himself and Phil was about the same as why he loved reading. Fanfiction extended his sense of what could have been. For each story he could re-imagine his own life, how it could have been, what could still happen in the future. All the things he would _never_ actually accomplish. It sounded sad – well, it was kinda sad – but living a whole different life from the relative comfort of his own bed felt safe. Dan could try out new things and not deal with the consequences afterwards.

He was still worried about his future. He loved making YouTube videos, just as much as being on radio, but he felt that he should have higher ambitions, other goals. What if one day the internet was deleted? What was he supposed to do then? It therefore felt comforting to read about himself actually having dreams and goals. During his ‘research’, Dan had stumbled upon a fanfiction in which he had been depicted as a devoted florist. At first, Dan had laughed at how silly it sounded; but in the end he was surprised at how much he envied that Dan’s life. Sure, he wasn’t much of a flower expert, but he admired the other Dan’s passion. Apart from writing he had never felt any passion for anything. Not in a way that would help him find the purpose of his life.

He had hoped that going to university would automatically solve that problem. After he found out that going to university meant that you should already know what you’re passionate about, Dan had felt lost. He couldn’t even pretend to feel anything about law. He couldn’t feel much regarding anything, really. Reading about florist!Dan’s ultimate goal to open a flower shop and succeeding made him feel, for a very fleeting moment, that he could accomplish anything, too, if he just believed hard enough.

Of course, life wasn’t as easy. Dan had never believed in the laws of attraction, or whatever that shit was called. He knew that achieving your goals meant hard work. And work meant possible success, but also failure. Dan was afraid of failure. That was also the reason why he hadn’t considered writing an actual novel. He could have written it just for himself, without publishing it, but even that seemed like it could go horribly wrong. And besides, how much value would it have anyway? He rather published his latest Phan-Highschool-AU on tumblr. The internet – and his anonymity – meant safety. And besides, a novel seemed like a burden too big for one man alone to carry.

For Dan to include Phil in all of his fanfiction seemed natural. Whether it was as a friend, a friend-to-be or lover, Phil was a constant in his life – the only one, maybe – and writing anything not starring him as well felt wrong. He would never say it to his face, but Phil had grown to be very important to him. Phil had always been the one who made him laugh. He had been the one who had dragged him out of a very dark place years ago. Dan knew Phil would do it over and over again if Dan needed him to.

Sometimes, people in the comments would say that they acted like an old married couple. Dan hated to admit it, but they were right. But even when he wondered where all his cereals vanished to or picked up Phil’s socks from all over the flat, he would never want Phil to leave. He enjoyed the life they shared. Dan often thought that he should tell Phil how important he was to him. You could never know when it was too late. But unfortunately, Dan had always been bad with expressing his feelings. He hoped that Phil _just knew_ , that he could understand the words Dan would never be able to say out loud.

It seems contrary that Dan would agree to write a book. When they received the offer from the publishers, Dan had been sceptical. There were so many YouTubers out there who were currently writing books or had already published ones. Publishing houses surely knew where to cash in even more money. Phil, however, had been so excited. Everyone knew that Phil’s excitement was highly contagious. He could barely contain it and immediately began to sketch out ideas. Dan just couldn’t resist Phil’s big puppy dog eyes. Dan also guessed that writing with Phil – like creating anything with him – would surely be fun. So they accepted the offer. They both knew immediately that they wanted to capture all of the world they created with their fans into one, physical book; to make the ephemeral everlasting.

It was a whole new experience for Dan to write alongside someone. But even though it was different, Dan enjoyed it just as much as writing on his own. Plus, as soon as he run out of ideas, Phil would come up with something new, which in turn sparked another idea in Dan’s brain, and so it went on and on. They could have filled a thousand pages and still wouldn’t have run out of ideas.

However, Dan had not been the one to suggest writing Phanfiction. One day, Phil had stormed into the sitting room waving his laptop around and shouting, “Dan, I just had the best idea ever, look at this!” and he thrust his laptop into Dan’s face. Dan had just been working on his childhood page and was rather annoyed that Phil had interrupted his flow, but he took the computer anyway. Phil had barely written a page, and it was titled _The Hand_. Dan looked at him quizzically. Phil waved his arms around and explained, “It’s a fanfiction, Dan! We should totally write some original fanfiction! All gen, of course.” Phil looked at him eagerly, expecting Dan to burst into excited cheers.

Instead, Dan just looked at him. He was surprised that it was Phil who had come up with this idea, and not him. On the one hand, he really liked the idea. On the other hand, he feared that he would give away too much by writing a story. Yes, that was ridiculous. But that was just how Dan’s brain worked. Then again, it seemed illogical to say no, especially because he had always been the one who wanted to read Phanfiction on camera. And besides, Phil had already written something.

Without saying anything, Dan faced the laptop and began to read Phil’s fanfiction. The piece was ridiculous, but Dan knew that this was intentional. He even barked out a laugh once or twice. When he handed the laptop back to Phil he could see that his friend had a pink tinge on his cheeks. “So, did you like it?” Phil asked. Dan flashed him a smile. “Yes, it’s great!” Phil returned the smile and bounced slightly on the balls of his feet in excitement. In moments like these he really resembled an overgrown, energetic puppy. “Are you going to write something as well? It would be so much fun!” Dan really had to consider this. But one look at Phil’s face did it for him. He just couldn’t say no.

And that was why he was unable to sleep the following nights. He just didn’t know what to do. He feared that if he wrote something, _anything_ , someone would immediately find out that he wasn’t an amateur when it came to Phanfiction. He thought about writing some badfic. But when he told Phil, he said that Dan should at least try to write something that was better than his. To balance it, so to say. Well, he could definitely do that. But what if someone made the connection…?

Dan browsed through his own conglomeration of stories one sleepless night, fretting over his task. He thought about telling Phil that he couldn’t come up with an idea. But if he was being honest, that wasn’t the truth. The problem was that Dan tended to have a pattern for each of his accounts. For example, he only wrote Highschool or University AUs for one of his tumblr accounts. So far he had been unable to come up with anything different from what he normally wrote. It frustrated him, mostly because it seemed like he had already hit the wall and wrote about everything there was to write about. If he wanted to keep his obsession secret, he needed to find something original. More importantly, if he wanted to be a truly good writer, he had to come up with something unique. Dan was barely present for the following days. He tried to write on _Dan’s Highschool Life_ , thinking that maybe while concentrating on something different, inspiration might struck him. Nothing happened.

One night, when he lay wide awake, his mind racing while checking for the umpteenth time if Kanye had tweeted something new, he accidentally dropped his phone and it rolled under the bed. He bend over and groped around until he felt something and tugged. It wasn’t his phone, but a dusty copy of _Twilight_. PJ had given it to him as a joke, and Dan had actually considered reading it but forgot about it when it went missing. Suddenly it struck Dan. Of course! That was the perfect story! He flung around and grabbed his laptop. He knew there were a few vampire Phanfics out there, but not enough to argue that this was an old trope. Besides, he could take up the overused trope of Phil dying as well (and resurrect him – he didn’t like the thought of Phil being dead, not even in stories). And, more importantly, Dan had never wrote any supernatural stuff. He had never thought about it up until that moment. It was perfect! No one would suspect anything, least of all Phil. Dan’s hands flew over the keyboard and within a short time he had the perfect one shot for their book.

Dan showed _The Urge_ to Phil the next day. Dan stood next to the dining room table, anxiously twisting the hem of his shirt. He hoped Phil didn’t find it too ridiculous. But Phil could hardly contain his astonishment (and his giggles) throughout reading it. “This is brilliant!” he gushed after finishing it. “How did you come up with that?” Dan let out a breath he wasn’t aware he was holding. “I found my old copy of Twilight under my bed and it just came to me.” Phil looked at him amused. “You’re saying sparkly vampires keep you company at night?” Dan snorted and punched Phil lightly on the shoulder. “Shut up!” Phil looked back at the screen and scrolled though the document one more time. “No, really, this is amazing. You really are talented, you know?” He turned around, looking up at Dan again, suddenly very serious. “Have you been secretly practicing?”

Dan felt like all the blood vanished from his face. He blinked, unable to say anything for a second or two. Phil just looked at him with something in his eyes that Dan could not quite place. Before he could think more about it, he spluttered, “What? I don’t know what you mean. I’ve written some Pokemon fanfic in my teens but that was it!” He hoped that he just imagined his voice increasing in pitch by the time he ended that sentence. Phil continued to look at him, and Dan willed himself to steadily look back. What were actually just a few seconds felt like hours, and Dan hoped he hadn’t just given himself away. He inwardly prayed to all deities he could think of that Phil wouldn’t suspect anything. But then Phil smiled and said, “I’m kidding! But you really hid that talent of yours very well.” And he got up and walked towards the kitchen. “Do you want some tea?” he asked and vanished after Dan had mumbled an affirmation. Well, that had been close.

Shortly after that, Dan and Phil officially announced that they were writing a book on their channel. The time that followed was the busiest they ever had. They had to fill even more pages and edit those already written over and over again. Then there were photoshoots and the preparations for their book tour. They both tried very hard not to neglect their channels, and Dan felt like the only down time he really had was when he was asleep in his bed. On the plus side, he was now so tired in the evenings that he barely had any sleepless nights.

Then, _finally_ , the book came out, and it was a success. Their fans loved it, and Dan could have cried for joy each time he read a positive comment. Well, he did cry sometimes. But alone in his room. It felt so fulfilling to have finally created something tangible that would bring joy to other people. Of course, he also had his YouTube channels that millions of people loved, but it felt somehow different with this book. _TABINOF_ combined all of the things that were important to him: he wrote the book with his best friend in the world; it contained the whole world he, Phil and their fans had created; it was a physical copy of his own devotion to his fans. When Dan held a copy of _TABINOF_ in his hands for the very first time he felt like one of the many Dan’s he had read and written about so often. He felt like he had finally accomplished something, and he felt confident that his future might not look as dreary as he had always imagined. He felt determined to keep going, to find out what else life held in stock for him – and Phil.

Due to all the _TABINOF_ excitement and their tour Dan had been unable to even think about writing any more fanfiction. He didn’t miss it much, but as soon as he and Phil both departed for their Christmas holidays he felt it again. This itching in his brain. This _urge_.

The night he came home he immediately sat down and wrote a new fanfiction. He took his time, revelling in the feeling.

_Dan ripped the paper off the parcel and held a shiny, colourful copy of his – their – book in his hands. Next to him, Phil gasped._  
_“It’s so beautiful! Open it, come on, I want to see it!”_  
_Dan flipped through the pages, mouth slightly agape in awe. He and Phil stood there in the middle of the lounge, silently flipping through the book. Dan felt dizzy from all the colours. Or maybe it was from the fact that he still couldn’t believe that this was the book he and Phil had spent ages writing. And now it was done. And it was perfect._  
_When Dan had turned the last page and closed the book he spent several seconds just staring at the blurb. It still felt so surreal. He turned his head to look at Phil. He, too, looked at him with big eyes, disbelief written all over his face._  
_“We did it. That’s our book,” Dan whispered_.  
_“Yeah,” Phil breathed. And without any warning he flung his arms around Dan’s neck and kissed him, squashing the book between them._  
Yeah, _Dan thought,_ we finally did it.

Dan smiled and closed his laptop. No one will ever know.

**Author's Note:**

> Some of the fanfics I mentioned really do exist!
> 
> **My Immortal** by Tara Gilesbie ( https://www.fanfiction.net/s/6829556/1/My-Immortal )  
>  **Reparations** by Saras_Girl ( https://archiveofourown.org/works/879599/chapters/1692075 )  
>  Dan read some of the Poketrainer-AU in his video **I will go down with this ship** ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c61d72fpa4c )  
>  Dan and Phil read **The Skin Fic** in Dan's video **Dan and Phil vs Tumblr** ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fl7nHK7GtY )  
>  **The Hat Fic** (If you want to read it google it yourself, but beware, it is REALLY disturbing)  
>  Florist!Dan appears in **I Dare You to Love Me** by starsalign ( https://archiveofourown.org/works/2300762 )


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